Mike Gribble, co-founder of Spike & Mike’s Festival of Animation, was just 42 years old when he died of pancreatic cancer in 1994 — an awful case of a larger-than-life film-world figure dying before his work was done. That probably would have been the perfect time for Kat Alioshin’s short, oh-so-adulatory “Animation Outlaws,” which plays more like a pop-art tribute video than a well-rounded documentary about Gribble and marginally less eccentric accomplice Craig Decker (aka “Spike”).
As it is, the film arrives long after the world of animation has been permanently reconfigured, thanks to a rebellious CG venture known as “Toy Story” and a little innovation called the internet. Today, it could be difficult to convince college kids — who grew up on Cartoon Network/Adult Swim, and for whom anime has moved mainstream — that there was a time just a few decades back when Disney was practically the only game in town.
As it is, the film arrives long after the world of animation has been permanently reconfigured, thanks to a rebellious CG venture known as “Toy Story” and a little innovation called the internet. Today, it could be difficult to convince college kids — who grew up on Cartoon Network/Adult Swim, and for whom anime has moved mainstream — that there was a time just a few decades back when Disney was practically the only game in town.
- 7/16/2020
- by Peter Debruge
- Variety Film + TV
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